Mallick: Col. Russell Williams, the souvenir hound
October 11, 2010
Rage and hatred were my initial reactions to the Col. Russell Williams case. They’re still bubbling along nicely with the news that he intends to formally plead guilty to the first-degree murder of Cpl. Marie-France Comeau, 38, and Jessica Lloyd, 27, the protracted sexual assault of two other women and 82 break-ins to steal lingerie.
The standard interpretation of such fetishism is that panties have intrinsic sexual power. Women may not want you, but you want them and now you have them, distilled, in their private garments worn next to private parts. One assumes Williams masturbated habitually. He may even have worn his trophies. Without a trial, we may never know.
When Williams and his wife socialized with the Tweed neighbour, he was committing delicious mind-rape, the joke being both on her and on Williams’ wife, Mary-Elizabeth Harriman, a woman who didn’t know her own home well.
This is odd. I know every inch of my house. It would be impossible to hide cartons from me. Perhaps Harriman was infinitely trusting of her husband, perhaps not. Another unsolved mystery.
Williams’ souvenir-collecting escalated. He was now saying, “I came, I saw, I took.” “I came into her house, I saw her fear, I took her picture.” His final theft was this: “I took her life.”
Why did he do it? He liked it.
Oh, the places he’s seen! In prison, the loss of his souvenirs will bother him most of all.
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/edit...-col-russell-williams-the-souvenir-hound?bn=1